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Ultrasound imaging of the brain

alephneuro.com

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Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#61

Post by CWuestefeld »

k33n wrote: post #51
switchbak wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"MRIs are actually widely available in most cities at reasonable cost" - I live in one of those first-world countries, and our citizens regularly wait many months if not over a year to get a single MRI scan. Yes, it's not just an issue of the MRI but the entire medical system, but the point still stands. Were there machines that were one or more orders of magnitude cheaper and simpler to run - I think we would see a…

Many months to a year for an MRI? Wow, in the USA, we can get MRI's the same day or at worst case, week. It's been that way for a decade or more.

Scarcity demands some means of rationing out the product. Setting higher prices is one means of doing this, so only those with some means of paying can get it. Another approach is via wait times, where only those who can wait and afford the time penalty can get it. There are other variations, but there's no such thing as a free lunch.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#62

Post by thaw13579 »

lostlogin wrote: post #57
thaw13579 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is a economic & public health policy problem that really needs to be solved. We can look to Japan as example of what's possible, they have invested in nearly twice the number of scanners per capita of Canada, and they can get same-day MRIs for $50, roughly speaking.

> they can get same-day MRIs for $50 I’d like to see a breakdown on how they do that. Staffing alone is a multiple of that.

From what I know, seems like a mix of medical price fixing by the gov't, adoption of lower cost hardware, and universal healthcare. There's apparently less bureaucracy, perhaps because there is no need for negotiation at every step of the process?

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#63

Post by vixen99 »

lostlogin wrote: post #57
thaw13579 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is a economic & public health policy problem that really needs to be solved. We can look to Japan as example of what's possible, they have invested in nearly twice the number of scanners per capita of Canada, and they can get same-day MRIs for $50, roughly speaking.

> they can get same-day MRIs for $50 I’d like to see a breakdown on how they do that. Staffing alone is a multiple of that.

Romania: for a head MRI on demand - not more than a few days and less than 400 Euros.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#64

Post by joezydeco »

CWuestefeld wrote: post #61
k33n wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many months to a year for an MRI? Wow, in the USA, we can get MRI's the same day or at worst case, week. It's been that way for a decade or more.

Scarcity demands some means of rationing out the product. Setting higher prices is one means of doing this, so only those with some means of paying can get it. Another approach is via wait times, where only those who can wait and afford the time penalty can get it. There are other variations, but there's no such thing as a free lunch.

The scarcity comes from waiting to get preapproval from your physician and health insurance. If you are willing to pay out of pocket, there are many private MRI clinics that will scan you to your heart's content, as quickly as you want, as long as the payment clears.

Granted, anything you find in that reading won't be accepted by your physician or insurance company, so it's more of a checkup for you and you alone. And most scans will find something anomalous. We're all asymmetrical and lumpy. so take that as you will.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#65

Post by [deleted] »

lostlogin wrote: post #57
thaw13579 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is a economic & public health policy problem that really needs to be solved. We can look to Japan as example of what's possible, they have invested in nearly twice the number of scanners per capita of Canada, and they can get same-day MRIs for $50, roughly speaking.

> they can get same-day MRIs for $50 I’d like to see a breakdown on how they do that. Staffing alone is a multiple of that.

[deleted]

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#66

Post by trevor-e »

Not trying to sound alarmist at all but I am wondering if ultrasounds are safe to be used like this? My understanding is it's basically a high-frequency sound wave which is probably fine for most tissue usage, however here it says it's scattering off of red blood cells. I don't know why that feels so unsettling to me.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#67

Post by crmd »

Amazing spacial precision but the article doesn’t mention the time domain. I assume a brain interface needs to have a pretty high sampling rate in order to meaningfully decode human thought.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#68

Post by anax32 »

Can anyone explain how this ultrasound can see through the skull?

I've worked on ultrasound devices and data, the shadows from bone, and distortions caused by tissue types were very difficult. If this device can deal with those distortions it would already be useful for lung imaging.

Re: Ultrasound imaging of the brain

#69

Post by janalsncm »

thaw13579 wrote: post #38

Cool work and proof of concept, and very excited to see where this goes. However, I do think there is enough exaggeration and missing information here that it warrants some critical appraisal. What's really missing is a comparison and validation with any existing medical imaging tech. Whole brain, contrast-free neurovascular imaging is essentially solved with MRI, why not run a scan and compare? Ultrasound is of cour…

As the article says, their ultrasound machine costs about as much as a smartphone. It’s about $4000.

An MRI machine costs roughly 1000x as much.

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